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It is the sequel to this game that is also stellar or less-than-stellar, depending on whom you speak to:

Some shamelessly stolen Wiki info!

Assassin's Creed II is a third person action-adventure video game developed by Ubisoft Montreal and published by Ubisoft. The sequel to Assassin's Creed, it was released on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in November 2009. A PC version is scheduled for release on 20th November 2009. The player assumes the role of a young nobleman-turned-assassin named Ezio Auditore da Firenze who is seeking revenge on the rival families that murdered his father and brothers.

What is the Assassin's Creed?

1. First, do no harm

2. You do not talk about the Assassin's Guild

3. ???

4. Profit

The Story So Far (Assassin's Creed 1 spoilers)

Assassin's Creed is the story of Desmond Miles.

+=

A (presumably) twenty-something bartender, Desmond wakes up one day to find himself strapped to a metal table of sorts. He has no recollection of how he got there, but he is being held captive by two scientists - Dr. Warren Vidic and Dr. Veronica Mars - that work for a scientific corporation called Abstergo Industries.

Vidic reveals to Desmond that the scientific team at Abstergo has uncovered the fact that memory is stored in DNA. So when you die, your memory will be implanted somewhere in your child's DNA, you have your father's memories in your DNA, so on and so forth. This accounts for "animal instinct" in lower life forms, such as the migratory patterns of birds in the winter. Bad news for Desmond, they reveal that not only do they know that Desmond was raised since birth to be an Assassin, but he is also the descendant of an Assassin who knew information they considered vital. Seeing as death sucks pretty badly, Desmond has to comply and be hooked up to a machine that will allow him to remember the life and times of an ancestor in 1191 Jerusalem, an Assassin named Altair. (Editor's Note: Altair means eagle. So does Ezio!)

In Altair's memories, he's kind of a dick. There are three simple rules to being a good assassin (a creed, if you will) and he manages to horribly fuck up all three in the span of one mission and also fails to kill his target, but yet we are led to believe that Altair was valedictorian of the Assassin school. Anyways, he kills an innocent, is not very discreet, and compromises the brotherhood. He tries to be a cock and lie about it, but one of his clan members exposes him, and also brings the treasure that they were sent to retrieve, effectively upstaging Altair. In retaliation, the target who was supposed to be dead, Robert de Sable, leader of the Knights Templar, leads an attack on the Assassins.

The Assassins are successful in defending their home. However, to make an example out of Altair and punish him for his terrible behavior, his clan leader, Al Mualim, fake-stabs him for some reason but then tells him that he can make up for his transgressions after all. I never really got the whole fake-stabbing thing 'cause it's not like he secretly let him live, all the Assassins you meet afterward are all like "Oh hey Altair! You're a pretty cool guy."

Anyways, Al Mualim is all like "Hey, there are nine bad men out there. Kill them and you'll no longer be a novice. Also you'll remember some of the physical abilities you magically forgot when I demoted you." Since Altair lacks a personality and doesn't really have much else to do anyways, he agrees out of sheer boredom. Altair traverses through the three cities of Jerusalem, Damascus and Acre, picking off the nine targets one at a time. Upon meeting their end, each has time to give lengthy speeches that sometimes bores to tears and always successfully freeze time; upon the instant of their death, time unfreezes and guards start attacking.

They all say vague, cryptic things, and when Altair confronts his master about this, he spits out vague, cryptic things. Upon assassinating Robert de Sable, his target reveals that Al Mualim himself is a member of the Knights Templar. Altair confronts Al Mualim with this accusation, who responds with a resounding "Well duh." He then brings out the treasure that was retrieved (by the lesser student) in that first mission that Altair botched, and reveals it to be a "Piece of Eden", which is apparently good for mass mind control in addition to looking pretty nifty. Remember when Bright Eyes parted the Red Sea so that he could let his people go?

Impossibilities like that (also the ten plagues of Egypt and Clash of the Titans) were apparently caused by the kind of mind control this thing delivered, so obviously it was being fought over by these two powerful groups of Assassins and Templars. Tired of the manipulative dickery he had been subject to his whole life, Altair shanks Al Mualim and takes the Piece of Eden. At which point, a holographic map shoots out of it and shows the locations of the other pieces.

This is the memory that Abstergo was looking for. After they retrieve the memory, Vidic tells Desmond he was ordered to be killed, but Veronica saves his life by claiming that they might still have more use for his memories. Vidic reluctantly agrees, and Dr. Mars looks at you and bends her ring finger down, a gesture showing that she's on your side (Assassins in the old days would have their ring fingers removed because they were fucking hardcore). As Desmond is left alone, he finds that he has received a new gift; he knows kung fu. Not really, but he can see stuff in Dayglo vision, which is also handy, as it lets him see stuff that is incredibly well-hidden and also reveals enemies and allies. As the game closes, he goes back to his room with his newly acquired skill and sees the walls covered in a bunch of crazy shit: a bunch of symbols on the wall all alluding to the end of the world on December 21, 2012.

What's the deal with the DLC?

Basically, stuff that was cut out of the game for time reasons. Make no mistake - AC2 is a plenty full game even without said DLC, and the extra missions apparently have little bearing on the plot. They could have just abandoned work on these segments and never released them at all. Be grateful.

The first of the two packs, The Battle of Forli, will be available on January 28, 2010, for the measly price of $3.99 or MS Points, depending on your system.

The second of the two, Bonfire of the Vanities, has yet to be dated but supposedly is appearing in February. Expect a similar small price point.

Both are reported to be roughly a gig in size, so here's hoping you either have a PS3 or aren't stuck with one of those old 20 gig 360s.

Is this game better than the first? I hope they changed X, because X sucked in AC1!

Yes, and they most likely did.

Mark your goddamn spoilers

We are getting into Lost and Battlestar Galactica territory here, folks. People use spoilers for jokes, I get that, so please mark if you're going to use the spoiler tag for actual spoilers, MARK IT SO. If you're not finished with the game, better to operate on the side of caution and just not click tags anyways.

Also, no fake spoilers. Crazy shit is happening, shit so crazy that if you were to pop in and say "The Animus was created by Wal-Mart in a bid to make everyone buy Miley Cyrus CDs!", some might have reason to believe it. Note: As far as I know, the Animus was not created by Sam Walton.

Are you stuck in a certain spoilery memory?

SPOILERS

There's a section where you play as Altair, and apparently some people don't know that Altair/Ezio is, in fact, capable of jumping straight up. Hold RT/R2 and press A/X and he will grab the small light fixture above and pull yourself up.

I got to what I thought was Venice last night. But then when I climbed up and took in the view it showed up to be some kind of smaller fortress-type of city. Quite awesome, I think I'll hang around there for a bit and do some thieving.

I got to what I thought was Venice last night. But then when I climbed up and took in the view it showed up to be some kind of smaller fortress-type of city. Quite awesome, I think I'll hang around there for a bit and do some thieving.

Forli, sounds like. Nice little side-mission area.

I haven't touched AC1 in awhile, but am I crazy or are the cities a lot larger in AC2? Although historically it makes sense too, that cities would have expanded...

I'm also greatly amused by people in other forums/youtube who are claiming there is codex glitch, when in fact their pieces are simply not set up right. "I know they're right because I used a walkthrough! Look here's a picture!".........your picture is wrong, I can tell just by looking it. Poor geography, we knew him well. Or not.

zellychan on December 2009

"I am the fabric of history, you are a fictional stain! I'll stick a flag up your ass and claim you for Spain!" -Christopher Columbus

Actually, I'm pretty sure that codex map glitch does exist. As I was collecting the codex pages I periodically brought them back to the villa and orientated them to form the world map. When I finally got the last piece and finished the map, it was before the cutscene where Ezio is told to do so. When that cutscene occured, the map was already formed, and the game didn't seem to realise, so I had to spin all the pages and make the map again before the game acknowledged that the map was complete.

I really hope that the DLC holds some hints about where Desmond and all are going or what is in store for them. Maybe them in a car and they turn to Desmond saying we unlocked the sequences, etc and then talk about what to do next.

french revolution or during the reign of napoleon. why: capes still in, swords still in, pleanty of buildings and historical characters to reference that get killed, plenty of neat architecture that could be on the same engine as AC and AC2.

You got to Venice...then you were floored because you knew only Venice and Florence were in the game?

no i mean i didnt know that

san gimignano and the other small city, along with your hub and the countryside were in the game, so when i wound up there i was so happy to find out the game was much bigger than i thought it would be.

I got to what I thought was Venice last night. But then when I climbed up and took in the view it showed up to be some kind of smaller fortress-type of city. Quite awesome, I think I'll hang around there for a bit and do some thieving.

That's the "was obviously in the game already but they cut it out for DLC" city, so don't expect any plot quests there.

I'm still amazed more people aren't as pissed about this as I am. The games' chapters go 9-10-11-14. 9-10-11-14! They literally SKIP two chapters to sell them to you later! Not to mention an entire area, plus quest hook NPC, that's never mentioned again.

To be fair, the stuff in those chapters is kinda unrelated to the plot at hand. There are no assassinations in that time period of major figures. It's not like they say "Oh yeah, and Ezio singlehandedly wiped out half the Venetian government, but we're just skipping that for now."

french revolution or during the reign of napoleon. why: capes still in, swords still in, pleanty of buildings and historical characters to reference that get killed, plenty of neat architecture that could be on the same engine as AC and AC2.

You got to Venice...then you were floored because you knew only Venice and Florence were in the game?

no i mean i didnt know that

san gimignano and the other small city, along with your hub and the countryside were in the game, so when i wound up there i was so happy to find out the game was much bigger than i thought it would be.

Watch Napolean actually be a friend of the Assassins and the alliance against him are the Templars getting up in arms.

I got to what I thought was Venice last night. But then when I climbed up and took in the view it showed up to be some kind of smaller fortress-type of city. Quite awesome, I think I'll hang around there for a bit and do some thieving.

That's the "was obviously in the game already but they cut it out for DLC" city, so don't expect any plot quests there.

I'm still amazed more people aren't as pissed about this as I am. The games' chapters go 9-10-11-14. 9-10-11-14! They literally SKIP two chapters to sell them to you later! Not to mention an entire area, plus quest hook NPC, that's never mentioned again.

*sigh* God, I hate what gaming is becoming.

Are you saying you didn't get 60 bucks worth of gaming?

How about they just charge you 70-80 bucks next time and give you all 14 sequences?

I think they plotted out the game, saw some room for unrelated story and decided to leave room for themselves. They make a before-Christmas release date and get to polish up the extra content some more.

They obviously PLANNED for the extra content, but to say they had it done and ready for release? Not in the least bit likely to be true. There is no reason to wait. They should release it now to keep copies from the used bins and ride the tide of high sales with high DLC sales.

It isn't ready. It was planned for, but not completed in time for release. It is extra content outside of the main story.

VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
Bacardi, is there no way for content to be worth 20 bucks?
Are you saying twenty dollars each or 20 for both?
If it gives you 8 hours of fun, is it not worth it?
How can you just make a blanket statement like that without have a clue about the quality of the game?

french revolution or during the reign of napoleon. why: capes still in, swords still in, pleanty of buildings and historical characters to reference that get killed, plenty of neat architecture that could be on the same engine as AC and AC2.

You got to Venice...then you were floored because you knew only Venice and Florence were in the game?

no i mean i didnt know that

san gimignano and the other small city, along with your hub and the countryside were in the game, so when i wound up there i was so happy to find out the game was much bigger than i thought it would be.

but you have to admit: the capes are there, the hats are awesome, the guns arnt overpowered yet and swords are still around, Paris and Versailles would be interesting and reek of "avoid the guards" stealth gameplay, hedge maze level!, plenty of sexy ladies, hidden treasure everywhere, bandits, horses, did i mention crazy hats and capes? Oh yea you could have some famous music composers in there as the geniuses. put ac3 in revolutionary France!

tldr if they choose generic video game japan or ww2 im going to kick a puppy

If Desmond/Altair/Ezio have these special abilities (eagle vision and super agility) becuase they are descendants of one of the "gods" race then wouldn't they be able to access one of the "gods" memories and possibly find a way to avert the earths destruction? assuming that's what the chick at the end is talking about.

If so possibly a futuristic "god" city will be playable, or at least partially.

I wish people would stop bitching about the "missing memories". They CLEARLY never intended to include the Bonfire of the Vanities/Sforza content in the original game, it has absolutely no bearing on the overall plot. But they saw the potential for doing some cool stuff with it as additional missions for DLC, so they included references to it in the game to tie it all together and make it seem like the DLC is part of the whole once it is released. I, for one, think it is ingenious.

I got to what I thought was Venice last night. But then when I climbed up and took in the view it showed up to be some kind of smaller fortress-type of city. Quite awesome, I think I'll hang around there for a bit and do some thieving.

That's the "was obviously in the game already but they cut it out for DLC" city, so don't expect any plot quests there.

I'm still amazed more people aren't as pissed about this as I am. The games' chapters go 9-10-11-14. 9-10-11-14! They literally SKIP two chapters to sell them to you later! Not to mention an entire area, plus quest hook NPC, that's never mentioned again.

*sigh* God, I hate what gaming is becoming.

I would agree with you if AC2 were an 8 hour game.

But as it is I got _34 hours_ out of this game, and I skipped almost all of the assassination contracts, courier missions, and races. And the feathers.

I feel fully satisfied with what was included in the game that shipped.

I got to what I thought was Venice last night. But then when I climbed up and took in the view it showed up to be some kind of smaller fortress-type of city. Quite awesome, I think I'll hang around there for a bit and do some thieving.

That's the "was obviously in the game already but they cut it out for DLC" city, so don't expect any plot quests there.

I'm still amazed more people aren't as pissed about this as I am. The games' chapters go 9-10-11-14. 9-10-11-14! They literally SKIP two chapters to sell them to you later! Not to mention an entire area, plus quest hook NPC, that's never mentioned again.

*sigh* God, I hate what gaming is becoming.

I would agree with you if AC2 were an 8 hour game.

But as it is I got _34 hours_ out of this game, and I skipped almost all of the assassination contracts, courier missions, and races. And the feathers.

I feel fully satisfied with what was included in the game that shipped.

Feeling ripped off is just a psychological thing here. You would feel differently if it were 9-10-11-12 with 13-14 being the DLC. Why are you letting something so minor and obvious manipulate you this way?

Kind of tempted to buy this just so I can pick holes in the depiction of Firenze/Florence, given I've spent a couple of weeks there.
Is that likely to be the case?

Depends. Were you there 400 years ago?

edit: If not the DLC, people would just be complaining about all the game breaking bugs and stuff that Ubisoft is a little too lazy to fix. What's that, deaf people? No AC1 plot for you. People who like to save their game? Corrupted file!

Bacardi, is there no way for content to be worth 20 bucks?
Are you saying twenty dollars each or 20 for both?
If it gives you 8 hours of fun, is it not worth it?
How can you just make a blanket statement like that without have a clue about the quality of the game?

It would be worth 20$ if it gave me 8 hrs + of NEW experiences, ie a new city or some districts that have not yet been made. That could be one or both, as long as its new.

Otherwise no. I have newer games to buy, places to be, and other experiences that i can spend 20$ on these days. They don't instantly deserve my money because they have DLC, even if i do love their game. Its probably DLC from the full game that they stripped out anyway... which is kinda insulting, and by the time it comes out i will have moved on. So in a way, for me (and you can disagree and hate me for it) DLC has to be better than the main game for me to pay attention to it. I have to admit that the idea of seeing the